§ Mr. Asshetonasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that an employed person who has not accounted for the whole of his tax liability under Pay As You Earn is now receiving in part or in full repayment of his 1945–46 postwar credit, while an employed person who has not under paid for past years obtains no similar benefit and a taxpayer whose personal income is assessed under Schedule D is likewise receiving no benefit; and what steps he is taking to remove this anomaly.
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§ Mr. DaltonI assume that the right hon. Gentleman is referring to the arrangement announced in my answer of the 29th October last to a Question by my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley (Mr. Sharp), under which underpayments of tax for any year which were outstanding at the end of the year 1945–46 and therefore fell to be coded in so as to be added to the tax deductible under P.A.Y.E. in a subsequent year would be recovered Joy set-off against the postwar credit for 1945–46. This arrangement, which saved a substantial amount of work in tax offices, was adopted solely because shortage of P.A.Y.E. staff made it impossible to carry out the work of coding, and I cannot agree that a step which was so dictated by force of circumstances, should be regarded as a precedent in a field where no similar consideration arises.